Doha Tournament

[Front242]

This is nothing to do with confidence as Nadal actually played very well. Novak is just on a whole different level right now and in today's final played one of the best matches I've ever seen him play.

 

[Fiero425]

Nadal only managed to win 3 games? Geez. I thought he'd at least make it 6-3, 6-3. Gonna have to revise my prediction that he'll raise his game and win a Slam this year. At this rate the's looking like Murray against Nole. And that's NOT a compliment. AT least Roger makes the matches close and occasionally wins a final against him. It's at times like these that you can see Nadal's lack of confidence and his belief that he'll never be #1 again. Which is an interesting mindset because Federer clearly doesn't think the same way. And even Murray says he knows he can do better in these big matches against Fed and Nole. Who'd have thought Nadal would ever lose this much confidence in himself? I'll give him until the French. If he can't suck it up for the French, then I'm sticking a fork in him and turning him over - cuz he'll be done.

:clap :snicker :cover :deadhorse

 

[pavlik89]

[video=youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pA6TGcFv5Ro[/video]

 

[Carol]

Thanks to the heaven that I haven't seen that bad match and ridiculous result. I can think that Novak tried to play his best and Nadal obviously his worst but it doesn't matter, call me optimist or what ever you like but I keep saying that things will change soon and that result has not affected to Rafa to play better in the AO

And this is the best joke that I've heard a long time from a tennis player with a very good sense of humor :snicker

http://youtu.be/F6AoFqX0pbQ

 

[Front242]

I'm sure things will change soon too. He'll definitely win more than 3 games next time against Novak. Other than that though...expect more of the same.

 

[mrzz]

My fellow Fed fans might not like this, but it is my view that Novak, since the beginning of 2015, has been the best player in tennis history in terms of overall consistency and level. He may not surpass Federer's overall record, and someday we'll see a player who takes up another notch, but right now Novak is playing better tennis than anyone ever has. Pretty cool to witness.

Agreed with consistency part.

 

[Front242]

Agreed with consistency also but his offensive skills do not surpass prime Federer's. Defensive yes. And despite what Nadal fans who love to harp on about weak era bs will say, this isn't a particularly strong top 10 right now when the number 1 guy has been beaten 4 out 10 times by Federer in 10 matches and only 1 out of 10 by Nadal and 1 of the last 11 by Murray. Those are ugly stats.

 

[BIG3]

Missed the match, but fortunately watched highlights here.

Congratulate to Nole and his fans. Hope he can bring such form to slam final.

For Rafa and his fans, it is not the end of world. Doha is only ATP250, not much more than exhibition in my eyes. Did we even talk about Thailand last year? Plus, it is hard court, Nole's turf, but Rafa conquered twice in USO final. It inflicts Nole forever and Rafa needs to pay back sometime.

 

[Front242]

Sure it's a small tournament but it's a cumulative effect. Head to head now in Novak's favour, 9 of the last 10 matches won by Novak, etc. Not exactly gonna instill any sort of major belief anytime soon despite people trying to be positive. There literally is no positive to take. Nadal played very well today and still got absolutely slaughtered.

 

[the AntiPusher]

Btw unless I'm mistaken, as soon as the AO points come off, Roger automatically leap frogs ahead of Andy back to number 2 where he belongs as he lost dismally in the 3rd round last year while Andy reached the final.

Well that'll be a little late as the seeding has already been solidified for AO! :angel: :dodgy: :ras: Even though I'm no fan of Murray's, I felt bad for him; performing well the 1st half of the season with a major final, a 500, and Masters win beating Nadal on clay along the way! I saw him winning that semi-final match at Wimbledon, but after Roger dismantled him I fell off his bandwagon! Both need to be consistent to hold onto that #2 for the rest of the season! That'll be the big contest all year along with Nadal trying to keep up! :cover :nono :angel: :dodgy:

Frankly Murray owes his #2 ranking to Roger skipping 2 1000 events - Miami and Toronto. Murray made the final in Miami (600 points) and won Toronto (1,000 points). So that's 1,600 points that Roger spotted Murray :laydownlaughing and he still managed to finish the season only 680 points behind Murray. Roger also lost in the first round of Madrid, which Murray won - so there's another 950 points he handed Murray. Frankly if Stan didn't always have his head in up his butt he could be #3. He's definitely the most inconsistent #4 player I've seen in a long, long time.

Sure it's a small tournament but it's a cumulative effect. Head to head now in Novak's favour, 9 of the last 10 matches won by Novak, etc. Not exactly gonna instill any sort of major belief anytime soon despite people trying to be positive. There literally is no positive to take. Nadal played very well today and still got absolutely slaughtered.

I agree with all of this but Rafa played very well .It's no way he could have played well without breaking Novak serves or rhythm of his strokes.

 

[Front242]

^ His shots were deep today, not the usual short balls we've been seeing for quite a long time from him. He made very few errors. He had hardly any winners and the scoreline was brutal because Novak was just too damn good, but he did play very well. Novak was so good Rafa wasn't able to increase his winner count but Rafa played an aggressive, clean match. He was just up against the best I've seen from Novak ever.

 

[Fefe26]

when will Rafa realize he needs to improve his gain. nole and fed have work and better their game and this dude is out there with the same stuff.

 

[Fiero425]

when will Rafa realize he needs to improve his gain. nole and fed have work and better their game and this dude is out there with the same stuff.

Saw him in final against Federer in '09 pn TCC recently and Roger had to use every trick he had in his arsenal just to stay with Rafa! His shots were deeper, traveled faster with not as much arch, and they didn't drop as short in the court as Rafa's FH drops in the court now; sometimes barely clearing the net! :cover :nono :angel: :dodgy:

 

[Carol]

Well that'll be a little late as the seeding has already been solidified for AO! :angel: :dodgy: :ras: Even though I'm no fan of Murray's, I felt bad for him; performing well the 1st half of the season with a major final, a 500, and Masters win beating Nadal on clay along the way! I saw him winning that semi-final match at Wimbledon, but after Roger dismantled him I fell off his bandwagon! Both need to be consistent to hold onto that #2 for the rest of the season! That'll be the big contest all year along with Nadal trying to keep up! :cover :nono :angel: :dodgy:

Frankly Murray owes his #2 ranking to Roger skipping 2 1000 events - Miami and Toronto. Murray made the final in Miami (600 points) and won Toronto (1,000 points). So that's 1,600 points that Roger spotted Murray :laydownlaughing and he still managed to finish the season only 680 points behind Murray. Roger also lost in the first round of Madrid, which Murray won - so there's another 950 points he handed Murray. Frankly if Stan didn't always have his head in up his butt he could be #3. He's definitely
the most inconsistent #4 player I've seen in a long, long time.

Sure it's a small tournament but it's a cumulative effect. Head to head now in Novak's favour, 9 of the last 10 matches won by Novak, etc. Not exactly gonna instill any sort of major belief anytime soon despite people trying to be positive. There literally is no positive to take. Nadal played very well today and still got absolutely slaughtered.

I agree with all of this but Rafa played very well .It's no way he could have played well without breaking Novak serves or rhythm of his strokes.

I saw the replay, Rafa played his worst match of this beginning of the year and as bad as many of 2015, incredible but true that poor and odd result but everything happens for a reason, I read that it has not affected him at all and he is very motivated for the AO

 

[Front242]

You're hilarious if you think he played badly. Go watch the match he played against Kuznetsov if you want an example of a bad match. A 3 setter against a total nobody. He did NOT play badly at all versus Djokovic yesterday. Novak was just flat out brilliant.

 

[Carol]

Rafa says: " If you get frustrated for somebody that is playing better than you, it's stupid. The real thing is I always think that if you are frustrated because somebody knows how to do something better than you, you are too arrogant or you are not smart enough. When somebody is better than you, you accept and you work to try to improve yourself , that's it. I look the things very clear, today Novak is better than me without any doubt"
Wise and honest comment by a real person and Champion who with that mentality will get more and more achievements for sure :clap :celeb:

 

[dante1976]

Highest praise for Novak's play today.

"I played against a player who did everything perfect. I know nobody playing tennis like this ever. Since I know this sport I never saw somebody playing at this level." - Rafael Nadal

http://espn.go.com/tennis/story/_/id/14535317/novak-djokovic-crushes-rafaek-nadal-qatar-open-final

My fellow Fed fans might not like this, but it is my view that Novak, since the beginning of 2015, has been the best player in tennis history in terms of overall consistency and level. He may not surpass Federer's overall record, and someday we'll see a player who takes up another notch, but right now Novak is playing better tennis than anyone ever has. Pretty cool to witness.

I watch/follow tennis since '83 and that is absolutely true Most complete and dominant tennis player ever (currently on another level above everyone else).

 

[Front242]

Again, in terms of consistency I agree and sorry to sound like cali here, but peak level Nalbandian would give him a run for his money and he never really played peak Nalbandian that much due to their age difference but when he did he was soundly beaten. Safin also ripped Novak a new one in Wimbledon miles after his prime and he hasn't really met any of these guys when they were in their peaks and in that respect he's being made to look more dominant. Federer at 34 is his main challenger right now and he's making a mockery of Nadal and Murray. The rest of the top 10 are simply not anywhere near consistent enough and frequently injured. There have been many eras of more challenging top 10-20 players but, yes, Djokovic is truly impressive right now, no doubt about it.

 

[El Dude]

I think what makes Novak so impressive is that he's so...impregnable, with no real weaknesses, no contexts where he suffers. We can point to his lack of a French Open title, but he clearly has no problem playing on clay, has a bunch of clay titles, and it seems a foregone conclusion that he'll win the FO eventually.

Every other great that I can remember and look back in the record had some kind of notable weakness, some context he struggled with, some player who had his number. Roger was near perfect except for Rafa, Pete couldn't win on clay, Bjorn had Mac, Mac had himself, etc. Novak has...nothing.

 

[Front242]

You forgot Novak has a 34 year old giving him fits at times and it says something about the low level of the rest of the tour that his biggest challenger is a guy turning 35 this year. Take Roger out of the picture and who exactly challenges him? No one lately. A few years ago when Roger and Rafa were better this was a tough era but right now it's not and it's making the domination a lot easier. Obviously it happens all the time that greats age and decline but he has no real challengers right now bar Roger. Just trying to put it in more realistic context.

Edit: and Stan. But he's totally inconsistent.